Archives: Dec 2010

Life is not complicated, no matter how often people try to claim otherwise. The key to a pleasant existence on this Earth is fairly simple: Spend more time doing things you like than doing things you hate, and you’ll live a charmed life. Rich or poor has very little to do with it. If you find a job and a mate you like, you’re 99 percent of the way there.

Attaining such a goal is certainly easier said than done, but with hard work and perseverance, it’s not difficult to remove or avoid at least a portion of the things you despise in life. Don’t like sitting in traffic? Go into work early and leave a little late. Don’t like cleaning the house? Stop going to bars and restaurants so often, or stop buying vintage jewelry and little angel statues on Ebay, and use the savings to hire a once-per-week cleaning service.

One of the things I hate most in life is conversation with random strangers. It’s awkward, forced, and usually ends with at least one participant hating human beings a little more than they did before. I especially get annoyed when casual acquaintances at work start conversations with me.

That’s why I write this column. It cuts down on the number of people asking me “What’s new?” They just read this column, see I’m writing about Hitler knitting snowpants for cats, and think, “All right, if Paul has time for this, he obviously has nothing else going on in his life. I’ll find someone more interesting to blather on with endlessly.”

This week at the Minneapolis airport, I had two random conversations forced upon me like rape. One involved the lack of interesting weather this week, and the other involved a reality show called “Hoarders” which apparently highlights people who refuse to throw out their own toenail clippings and urine. I would rather be found dead with my own penis in my mouth than discuss either of these topics with some hairy-necked man from Des Moines, so I had to find a way out.

Fortunately, over the years I’ve compiled a list of three conversations I can use with people that will immediately make them want to stop speaking to me. As a public service, I’m printing these gems here so like-minded introverts may use them as well.

Tactic #1

Man: Hey, did you hear how much snow they got on the East Coast?

Paul: A lot. Nice to meet you. Maybe I’ll see you around sometime.

Man: I think the paper said almost 30 inches!

Paul: Yeah, I already had this conversation with my dad. The difference is, I enjoy speaking to him.

Man: Boy, that’s a lot of snow! It makes me thank Jesus for giving it to them instead of us.

Paul: I find horses sexually attractive.

Man: What?

Paul: When I see a horse, I have an unbearable desire to kiss it on the lips and massage its genitals.

Man: Oh. I think my wife wanted me to meet her in the gift shop. Well, it was nice meeting you.

Tactic #2

Old Woman: Do you watch “Hoarders”?

Paul: No. but I do find horses sexually attractive.

Old Woman: Oh, that’s nothing. I saw this one episode with a guy who saves used toilet paper instead of flushing it down the toilet. His wife vomits into jars and then saves them under her sink. She can’t bear to throw them out because she thinks she might need them someday.

Paul: Y’know, people never write proper html website coding nowadays. It’s like, if you’re going to type “font face=’helvetica'” in brackets, you have to close that first bracket by adding another identical bracket later that has a slash, even if you want to use helvetica for the entire webpage. You can’t just leave the first bracket there unclosed. I mean, sure, the webpage looks exactly the same whether you close the first bracket properly or not, but it’s still incomplete coding.

Old Woman: Oh. Um…

Paul: Have you ever wondered how html tables work? You have a “table” bracket that represents the whole table, then a “tr” bracket for the vertical compartments within the table, and then the “td” bracket for the horizontal compartments within the table. The cool part is that once you do the “table” bracket, you can totally add in an infinite amount of other tables within that first table. Just add more “tr” and “td” brackets. So if I…

Old Woman: (pretends to be asleep)

Tactic #3

Young Man: So what do you do for a living?

Paul: I work at…

Young Man: I’m a Libertarian. Pretty much everyone’s a Libertarian, they’re just sheep who are afraid to admit it. They’re like, “Oh, I want everyone’s kids to have an education so we can advance as a nation and society,” but the thing about that is…

Our regular columnist, Paul Ryan, is off this week for Christmas, and also to complete an out-of-court settlement regarding some indecent exposure charges. In his absence, we’re reprinting a column Hitler wrote for Cat Fancy magazine in 1936. Enjoy.

Ze thing about dressing up your cat in ze snowpants is that ze cat, she will struggle. Like it or no, zere is not a special company that creates ze snowpants for kittens. You will have to buy snowpants from ze little babies section of department store, or steal them from a Jew.

If you are not liking ze color of ze snowpants available, you can dye them on ze laundry washboard in backyard. If you do not want to ruin ze laundry washboard, you can sneak into ze backyard of Jew and ruin theirs. But howevers, please to be advised that ze Jews, zey are cheap, so zey are probably scrubbing laundry with rocks.

If you do not mind ze delay, I would like to take zis time to list ze names of all ze cats in mein house: Mittens, Puddles, Poopsies, Adolf I, Adolf II, Adolf III, Return of Adolf, Ze Phantom Adolf, Shitters, Tickles, Mrs. Poosine, Swastikat, Meowsers Fortley, and one cat belong to Ada that we just call Ada’s Pussy.

Once you have ze snowpants, you must slide zem on die cat. Oh, I am sorry. Misunderstanding. Ze word “die” in mein country means “ze”. I do not mean you to kill ze cats, or to use snowpants on dead cats. Dead cats cannot enjoy ze snowpants as much as ze alive cats. Mein apologies. I am new contributor to Cat Fancy. I know very little English, only conversational so I can listen to ze Aunt Jemima pancake show on ze American radio.

I have subscription to ze Cat Fancy so long, and Ada gets so tired of me poking her and zaying, “Hey lady, look at zis cat and all of ze things cats are doings” that she tell me to write mein own articles so I don’t have to talk to her no more. She is currently in ze corner of room knitting swastika toilet paper. Hopefully someday, someone in Germany invent ze disposable toilet paper, so we won’t have to wash and reuse ze blankets in house for wiping.

Anywayze, I LOVE CATS!!!!!!!!!! Let me count you ze ways! Eins: zey little toes. Zwei: zey cranky attitudes like ze old man whose soup is cold at deli. Drei: fur makes great for wiping when zere is no more clean swastika scarves. Vier: ze meows zey cats make to tells you zey are dying and needs to be fed. Funf through zehn: I LOVE CATS FOR NO REASONS SOMETIMES!!!!!

Once you get ze snowpants onto ze cats, zey will try to remove zey snowpants, as ze snowpants are crushing ze cats’ tiny penises. When you try to remove ze snowpants, ze cat will be scared and tinkle all over you and ze snowpants.

Ze way in which to remove ze urine smell from ze snowpants is to place two tablespoons of baking soda into dish, add water until it form a paste, zen rub ze mixture over urine spot in cat snowpants. Baking soda, it absorb ze big pee and ze little pee. So does vinegar, so use it to rinse ze snowpeepants. Zen put zey in ze wash. Do not place snowpants in ze dryer, as zat has not been invented yet.

I hope very much you print zis articles of mein for your magazine of ze fancy cats. I know ze Jews have written you letters to tell you no, do not print Adolf’s excellent cat snowpants investigation, but zey are biased because I wants to kill all of them dead. Zat is all. No bigee.

Also, while I am having your ear, do you have ze Cat Fancy issue #143 with ze coupons for ze Fancy Feast cat foods? I tries to have ze wet cat food as it zis more delicousness, but zis food, it is so expensive. Even dictator cannot afford zis luxury every week. Please to be sending 463 of ze Fancy Feast coupons, or I kills you and I kills your family and I kills your moms.

Also, publish ze article mein cat snowpants. I am for serious. Zis is public interest article. People read zis on Sunday afternoon when ze husband is sleepy in chair and refuse to talk. I do not require ze payment. I do this only for ze fancy of cats that I am having. Zat is why we are so perfect for each other, Cat Fancy. If we were cats, we would be ze fanciest of ze cats of all-times.

Christmas is fast approaching, which means I now have both Santa Claus and Jesus watching over me like wanton perverts. As usual, I’ve procrastinated on being good until the last week before Christmas, and I figure the only way to get through this with presents is to come clean with all the bad things I’ve done this year.

Fortunately, we’re in a recession, so I’ve only had funds for limited debauchery this year. Here’s the list:

– I talked to my mom on the phone while using the toilet. She was unaware.

– One of my bosses put a bunch of chocolate gold coins out for everyone at work to enjoy. I took them all for myself, and continued not sharing them, even after coming down with a massive case of diarrhea from eating too many.

– I snuck a bunch of those orange candy Circus Peanuts into the movies in my back pocket, and then forgot they were there and sat on them. Since they were warm and smooshy and smearing all over everything, I wiped them on one of the seats. I’m still not sure if somebody sat on them, or if one of the theater workers had to clean it up. If it’s the latter, then they probably used a long stick to scrape it off, because by the time the movie was over that pile of orange looked like something much different than what it actually was.

– I also briefly considered throwing one of the Circus Peanuts at an overweight lady whom I deemed to be equal in weight to an elephant.

– Some guy commenting on an internet article said he didn’t like Kenny Rogers, so I told him he should go kill himself.

– Remember that thing I said about using the toilet while talking to my mom on the phone? I should also note that it wasn’t an isolated incident. I’ve done it at least 12 or 13 times. I blame my dad for giving me a bluetooth headset.

– I referred to one of my co-workers as “Peaches”, even though he clearly doesn’t appreciate such emasculating nicknames.

– In the midterm elections last month, I voted to cut school funding because I suspect it was a high schooler who broke into my car and stole my rearview mirror and Pearl Jam CD. I plan to continue voting to cut school funding until a high schooler gives me $10 and a gently used copy of “Vitalogy”.

– I watched “Gossip Girl” once because I heard the jailbait blonde chick was going to strip down to her bra. Then I fell asleep halfway through the episode and missed it. I was pissed.

– I spoke ill of Babar the Elephant on Twitter. I’m not sure if that’s actually bad or not, since he’s fictional, but I felt bad so I guess it counts.

– I told a pretty girl that I volunteer for charity “all the time” and “totally hate greedy, apathetic suburban people” who waste money on frivolous crap, even though that is an exact description of everything I enjoy in this world. It’s a good thing she found someone more interesting to sleep with, because if she had come back to my apartment she would have found an entire bookcase full of expensive vinyl toys that have no logical use or purpose in daily life.

– Not to keep going back to the same “phone in the bathroom” thing again, but I want to be honest: Any of you who have talked to me on the phone in the past year were probably talking to me while I was on the toilet. Especially if I was the one who called you.

– On my friend’s birthday, I bought her a McGriddle instead of a real present.

– I’ve used the phrase “janky old cunt” twice this week, both times to describe a woman in a wheelchair. However, in my defense, I’d like to note that there’s no way that janky old cunt should get a blue handicapped spot painted on the street outside her house when she already has a driveway.

– In October, I told a dear friend whom I’ve known for 20 years to “shove John Stamos up your butthole.”

– I’ve made roughly 742 comments on people’s Facebook profiles this year that were grossly inappropriate. I also made 1,346 comments on people’s Facebook photos that were borderline sexual harassment or insulting to Swedes.

– I stepped in dog poop and used the carpeted stairs in my apartment building to scrape it off. A week later, my landlord replaced all the carpeting in that one flight of stairs.

– For a short period in February, I told people I had a “secret black wife”. I later realized that since I’m single, there would be no reason for me to keep my imaginary black wife “secret”. Apparently I’m racist.

– I murdered three college students in the grassy clearing behind Wisconsin Indianhead Technical College. I also hid a Blu-Ray copy of the movie “Marmaduke” there. If you check the bases of all the trees, you will find one of these horrible things.

– Oh yeah, I almost forgot the worst thing I do every year: Writing these profane, childish columns.

Snowman Narrator: If I live to be 100, I’ll never forget that big snowstorm a couple of years ago. The weather shut us in and, well you might not believe it, but I got so drunk that I nearly missed Christmas. I threw up all over my wife… oh, excuse me, I got a little carried away there. My name’s Sam, and this is the story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Take it, Burl!

Burl Ives:(Silence, accompanied by a shot of Ives’ corpse decomposing.)

Snowman Narrator: Whoops! Heh. I forgot about that. Let’s just cut right to the North Pole, for the first scene of the story.

Mrs. Claus: You’re going to disappoint the children. They expect a fat Santa.

Santa: I can’t eat all this shit! I’ve got diarrhea so bad, I’m gonna have to eat the rest of this in the bathtub!

Mrs. Claus: Here’s some more lutefisk!

Santa starts punching Mrs. Claus in the face.

Snowman Narrator: Now don’t any of you worry about Mrs. Claus. It’s always the same story. She’ll be plenty healed up before Christmas Eve. Meanwhile, the elves are bustling with activity.

Head Elf: Hermey! Why weren’t you at elf practice? We missed your tenor in choir. You’re our only poof.

Hermey: It’s slave labor. You don’t even pay us, you just give us communal shacks to live in like Cubans who pick Florida oranges. I’m reading this book on dentistry so I can rip out all your teeth while you sleep.

Head Elf: I miss your touch, Hermey. Come back to me. Make me feel like a unicorn again.

Head Elf: I’ll rip out all your goddamn teeth.

Head Elf: I’ll show you a thing or two about dentistry!

The Head Elf starts punching Hermey in the mouth.

Snowman Narrator: [laughs] Midgets. They’re cute when they’re dead. And it looks like Rudolph isn’t doing any better at his reindeer tryouts.

Rudolph: Hey, Clarice? After practice, would you… would you…

Comet the Coach Rudolph, get back here! It’s your turn, y’know! You’d fly better if you stopped leading with your dick!

Rudolph: Gee, I gotta go back! (Starts to run off but then turns back) Clarice, would you… well, would you give me a tug after practice? I’m pretty stressed out, and I could really use one.

Clarice: Sure!

Rudolph: I’m getting a handy! I’m getting a handy!

Rudolph soars high into the sky, but biffs the landing, revealing his secret red nose.

Reindeer #1: Holy shit, he’s got a clown nose!

Reindeer #2: Hey Rudolph, do the curtains match the drapes?

Clarice: What is that, AIDS? Ohmygawd, you have AIDS, don’t you? Gross!

Snowman Narrator:(drinking a bottle of tequila) Oh. Hello. I didn’t expect that scene to be over so soon. Rudolph was so upset that he ran away from home, and Donner decided to go looking for him. Mrs. Donner wanted to go along, naturally, but Donner said…

Donner: No, this is man’s work.

Mrs. Donner: What the hell does that mean? You think women aren’t capable of walking around in the snow looking for someone? It’s the easiest shit ever. A retard could do it.

Donner: Watch your mouth around me, woman.

Mrs. Donner: I’m so sick of your shit. You can’t even get an erection anymore. Go find my son, you goddamn failure.

Donner starts punching Mrs. Donner in the face.

Snowman Narrator:(taking a leak in a snowbank) Oh. Hello. I was just practicing my cursive writing. While Rudolph’s father was fixing his mother’s poor manners, Hermey, Rudolph and Yukon Cornelius met by chance and formed a partnership.

Hermey: Did you mean to say pea soup? The expression is “thick as pea soup.”

Yukon Cornelius: You eat what you like, and I’ll eat what I like!

***Note: Next 10 minutes of story, including all screen time by the Bumble, has been removed to make room for more commercials***

Santa: Holy shit, it’s snowy! I can’t deliver toys when it’s snowy!

Mrs. Claus: Nonsense. This is the North Pole and you fly through the air. There’s nothing to crash into.

Santa: Fuck you, I do this for free! Maybe if parents really loved their kids, they’d get off their asses and buy presents themselves. Screw this. It’s cold as shit. I’m going to play Call of Duty: Black Ops in the rumpus room.

Mrs. Claus: That’s the worst Call of Duty game yet! They added all those stupid RC car and attack dog kill streaks and ruined the whole thing.

Santa: It’s all I have! I already sold Modern Warfare 2 at Gamestop. I’m stuck with this crappy new one!

Rudolph: Santa, I could lead the way with my nose.

Santa: Yeah, you do that. Have fun. If you need me, I’ll be inside getting high.

Mrs. Claus: Oh… I flushed all your weed down the toilet. It was making you too thin.

Santa starts punching Mrs. Claus in the face.

Rudolph: Stop hurting Mrs. Claus! I’ll call the police!

Santa: They’ll never come this far! That’s why I moved to the North Pole!

Santa continues punching Mrs. Claus in the face.

Snowman Narrator: [laughs] She’ll learn! And that, boys and girls, is the story of why your parents buy all your presents. It’s not that Santa isn’t real; it’s just that he’d rather get high. It’s time for the closing credits! Take it, Burl!

Burl Ives:(Silence, accompanied by a shot of Ives’ corpse decomposing.)